Space Ops: Shield AI Latest To Deploy Drone Autonomy To Spacecraft

In a sense, aerial drones and spacecraft are the same thing: uncrewed vehicles.

So, it is perhaps not surprising that more companies are retrofitting autonomous operations software, originally developed to control UAVs, for use on spacecraft.

Shield AI is the latest example of that trend, as it announced on Dec. 3 that it will use Sedaro’s simulation program to develop and test its Hivemind autonomy software for spacecraft. Shield AI previously had developed its Hivemind for aerial drones and uncrewed boats. Its UAVs include the tail-sitting, propeller-powered vertical-takeoff-and-landing (VTOL) V-Bat tactical surveillance drone and its X-Bat, a tail-sitting VTOL fighter jet that is still in development.

“We see autonomy in space as a natural extension of what we’ve built in the air domain. The challenges of space scale the same way they do for air systems, and Hivemind is built to solve exactly that class of problem,” Christian Gutierrez, Shield AI’s vice president of Hivemind solutions, tells Aviation Week. “Expanding into space is simply applying our field-proven, adaptable autonomy stack to a new domain where it makes just as much sense.”

Much of the autonomy’s underlying cognition core, planning, decision-making and multi-agent coordination functions translate directly to space, he adds. “This work focuses on enabling satellites and constellations to make rapid, adaptive decisions—especially when human control is limited,” Gutierrez says.

Scenarios in which spacecraft would use Hivemind autonomy software include proximity operations, dynamic multi-agent task distribution and real-time sensing optimization, Shield AI says.

“For example, an Earth-observation constellation could dynamically reprioritize imaging and tasking based on satellite state, weather, targets and mission needs without waiting on ground operators,” Gutierrez says.

The company says it is looking at options for testing Hivemind on a spacecraft in 2026.

Shield AI joins companies such as Anduril and Redwire that are straddling multiple domains with their autonomy software. In January, space company Redwire announced plans to acquire UAV developer Edge Autonomy for $925 million. The deal was closed in June.

The acquisition was driven by the U.S. Defense Department Joint All-Domain Command and Control (JADC2) strategy—an initiative to connect all sensors and shooters across military services—as well as the belief that spacecraft and UAVs are essentially both drones operating in different domains, Redwire said in January.

“One of the keys to our industrial logic—both from a customer and manufacturing perspective—is that space and airborne platforms are not as different as one might think,” Redwire CEO Peter Cannito said on a January call with investors. “Whether operating in space or as an airborne platform, they share technological building blocks.”

In 2024 and 2025, Anduril, a company developing autonomous drones, boats and ground vehicles, also announced plans to deploy its Lattice autonomy software on spacecraft made by Impulse Space, Apex and Argo Space.